


Thousands Of Feet March To A Beat

by Roverlord



Category: My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic
Genre: Alternate Universe, Male-Female Friendship, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Swearing, Violence, War
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-01-10
Updated: 2019-01-10
Packaged: 2019-10-07 15:38:05
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,000
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17368655
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Roverlord/pseuds/Roverlord
Summary: Thousands of feet march to a beat, it's an army on the march.Long way from home, paying the price in young men's lives.In this seriously alternate universe where the series never happened, an attack to a princess' wedding led to an anti-changeling pogrom in western Equestria, which caused violence, rioting, protests, and eventually sparked a civil war between Luna's east and Celestia's west.The Solar Empire seeks to keep the status quo, with the caste system and ponies superior to other species, such as griffons and dogs.The New Lunar Republic seeks a new order, in which ponies and other creatures exist as equals.This is a story of the war from the beginning to the end, told through the eyes of NLR medic Tiny Fang, Solar Empire's ace Lucky Star Thunderhoof, a propaganda performer Crystal Rose Sparkle, a steel-winged resistance fighter named Artemis Knightfall, and a nameless timberwolf who pulls a field kitchen cart.





	Thousands Of Feet March To A Beat

The air raid siren everybody had hoped would never be needed shrieked through the night, yanking Tiny Fang out from his slumber. He quickly grapped the saddle pack Dad had told him to keep keep packed, and rushed to his foal sister's room. He grapped the half-asleep baby by harness and put her in the other pack and turned to run.

"Doggy!" FrostWing frantically flailed towards an old and scruffy stuffed toy Tiny quickly threw in the pack too before running for his life, joining a stream of creatures rushing towards the town's air-raid shelter, pushing and trampling each other to get there first. Tiny could see the silhoulettes of the firebomber squadron against the full moon, and ran faster, tears of fear in his eyes. He didn't want to die! He tried to jump off a barrel to take off into flight, colliding with a griffin and plummeting face-first on the muddy street, run over by the panicked townspeople. He scrambled to his feet and looked around in panic, seeing Frost under a box about ten meters upstream from him.

The first bombs dropped, lighting the theatre ablaze. Tiny desperately struggled against the masses pushing him in the wrong direction, but he was never strong. The next bombs hit Rocky's house, and the fire throws sparks at the box.  
"FROST!!" Tiny mananages to take off, but his fly wings are slow.

He reaches the burning box and kicks it off, taking a hold of Frostwing with his front legs and flying towards the shelter, low enough to not become a target for the squadron's wingblades, having to dodge panicking people and burning rubble as the buildings started to collapse. He's knocked down again, and sees a Solar flyer swooping in, a firebomb on his belt and wingblades gleaming. He's paralyzed with fear and would be dead had another changeling not stepped in and shot a beam through the pegasus' chest. The gore splattered all over him and the dead body plummeted to the ground.  
"DON'T STOP!!"

Tiny forgot morals and manners and forced himself and Frost inside among the first ones, his eyes desperately scanning for Mom and Dad. He franctically goes around asking people if they've seen a colt with a wheelchair and mare cutie-marked with a royal flush and six-sided dices, but nobody either knows, listens, or cares.  
The explosions echoed from the air holes and they could smell people burning. Frost started to cry and Tiny tried to comfort her despite not being in any any better mental state himself.

"Daddy's fine, Frost. Mom's fine. They're fine, fine..." He started chanting those words to himself in desperation. He heard to small door slamming open again, but didn't look.

"Tiny! Frost!" Mom.

Dad's okay, they're both okay, but Dad's chair was wrecked and Mom's tail was schorched and her scalp had burned, the golden mane entirely gone. They hugged each other and didn't let go before the morning came and everybody was told to return home.

The Wintersong's inn had burned to the ground, nothing was left except for dad's partially melted medal from The Crystal War. They had nowhere to go now. He prayed that the firemen or the police or whoever was in charge would be kind and let them live in the shelter.

Many other buildings were in ashes too, when Tiny looked around he could see pony and griffin remains and a changeling corpse maimed with wingblades that the old gravedigger was taking away. He recognized the corpse, and prayed to changeling gods that their savior would get to a better place.

The mail office still stood, mostly intact through somewhat schorched, a doctor was nailing a draft station sign next to the door, next to it a propaganda poster depicting Captain NLR beating Tempest Division troops. The gas masks made Tiny flash back to a time before Frost's birth, three years ago, when their family had lived in Ponyville. The populace had never liked Tiny's parents adopting a changeling, and when the violence had started, the whole family had to escape. Tiny remembered hiding in trees and sleeping in chicken coops, eating leftovers until they had gotten out of the hostile area.

But not even moving to the other side of Equestria would alone save them. About a week ago, a war had been declared between the empire and the rebublic. Everybody's worst fears had come true. Hundreds had immediately gotten themselves drafted to fight, but many were too young, too old, too fearful, too 'important', or the only ones able to support the family, like Mom who worked at the canned apple factory that had probably been the attack's main target.

Tiny was afraid, but he was from the west and knew how the society had always worked there and had witnessed how mmuch worse the things had gotten after a small hive had attacked the Princess' wedding. Scanners detecting changeling magic. Shock collars preventing shapeshifting. He had also heard about, but not witnessed, police brutality and shootings. He had to do something.

* * *

 

"Wintersong, Tiny Fang"

Tiny walked behind the curtain for doctor's inspection.

"A changeling" the mare stated flatly " shouldn't you work for counter-intelligence? As a spy?"

"I cant, i... I have a.... Problem, sir"

The mare arched a brow questioningly.

"I... I can't shapeshift my whole body at once, only a few body parts at the time, sir"

"Can you use magic?"

"Not very well, sir"

"Can you do _anything_?"

Tiny folded his ears back in shame for his ineptitude "i've been studying to become a nurse, sir" he hadn't spoken about this to his family, and would not until he was at the point that he had to go no matter anything. He had to. The New Lunar Rebublic needed everybody, even a disabled changeling.

"You pass. Report there tomorrow"

Another Wintersong would arrive at the front line in in three days. Not as a soldier, but a medic, which would probably not be a lot lot better.

 


End file.
